I love eggs and eat two/day on my low carb regime. **SIGH**

Have you tried eating some lean meat for breakfast? If you have a deli near you that sells Boar's Head products, they make some low fat and low/no carb deli meats that are about the best quality available. I like their Tavern ham and roasted turkey breast. Two or three thin slices will give you the protein you need to start the day.

Teresa

Mustangs, do you mean that you've discovered that you actually LIKE eggs, or that you're eating them for any other reason?

Assuming the 30% rule is correct, I don't exactly know how to determine whether I'm one of those 30% without going off Lipitor and strictly monitoring my diet for months. That sounds neither fun nor healthy - since my cholesterol is extremely high without help - so I just choose to limit my egg intake.

I'm just frustrated, in general, with all the constant barrage of "good food" "bad food" information. I strive to eat healthy and, it seems, as soon as I light on a good diet plan I hear news like this that makes me second guess it. I confess that the analogy of eggs to smoking has made me kind of sick to the stomach.

I love eggs but I don't eat more than one or two a month now.

My cholesterol wasn't extremely high (221) when I had chest pain and ultimately a stent for a 99% blockage in one coronary artery earlier this year. I ate eggs or something with eggs in it almost every morning, but I was also getting a lot of fat and cholesterol from those other sources too.

I wonder if I had an egg with my oatmeal, would that be OK? LOL

I miss real eggs. I'll make Egg Beaters with cheese, Italian seasonings and salsa when I scramble eggs for the grandchildren (and sneak a bite of theirs). But there's nothing like a real egg.

I read the original study abstract from the three doctors who did it and based on that, will continue to eat whole eggs in the same limited quantities I have been consuming.

They noted that further studies of the high egg yolk eater's diets may be needed, probably along the lines of what was eaten along with the eggs, as momj47 indicated.

I believe a lot of whether eggs or beef or even fish is good or bad for you depends on what that food source ate. As someone already pointed out, there's a big difference in eggs from factory farms and eggs from hens that wondered around scratching the earth, eating what they're supposed to eat, rather than corn and the carp the factory farm hens are forced to eat. Even farm raised salmon has higher cholesterol than wild caught salmon.

Remember, too, that just because a carton claims it's cage free, doesn't mean the hen gets to wonder around outside and eat bugs. I've even seen expensive organic eggs for sale, touted as being fed a vegetarian diet, as if that's a good thing for hens. Tsk tsk, I just shake my head at that. (I'm sure that y'all already know that, though. I'm preaching to the choir.)

If you haven't already read them, I recommend reading Michael Pollan's books, Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food.

I'm lucky in that I do usually get to eat eggs I get from a farmer, but when I don't, I pay a premium to buy from a company I know does let their chickens wonder. Because those eggs are not cheap, and because I just don't like to eat eggs every day, simply for variety's sake, I only eat a couple, once or twice a week, and bake with them when the weather is not so hot.

Sally

Cholesterol levels are mostly genetic rather than diet. Heart disease is really pretty rare in non-smokers without diabetes genetics. However, diabetes genetics are very common (at least 25% of Caucasians and higher in other populations). Cholesterol is also not just cholesterol and total cholesterol may not predict heart disease as well as blood sugar levels, any way.

If you smoke, stop. If you are overweight, cut your portions in half and track your calories (Weight Watchers, Lose It, Fit Day, paper and pencil, etc.) until your weight is down. If you are sedentary, move around at least the equivalent of a brisk two mile walk daily. Fine tuning diet for the latest fad or study is much less important than the big three.

OTOH I don't know if cholesterol levels are good predictors of heart disease. Is there good evidence that this is the case? I know of several cases where someone with low cholesterol in apparently good health suffered a heart attack without warning.

Cheryl

FYI - I have no risk obvious factors, I'm not diabetic, never smoked, no apparent family heart disease risk (though my kids sure have one now) - cholesterol has always been under 200 till this year. I have well controlled hypertension and a stressful job. Sometimes there's no good explanation.

I got my cholesterol down to 94 on diet and medication, lost 35 pounds, exercise more regularly, we'll see if I can keep it going. I am kind of afraid of my food, now.

No fad diets, just fewer calories, less fat, and a food diary. Seeing what you eat can be quite jarring. Online diaries are really the best - you can scan the barcode of any food you use and you'll get the nutrient content - it can be startling. In many of them you can enter recipes and get a good breakdown for serving size. I still eat good stuff, just a lot less of it now.

I've only seen people drop cholesterol levels significantly without weight loss or medicine on a few occasions. It always happened in people with a significant fast food intake who went cold turkey.

If you read information from most egg promoting organizations, even they seldom recommend more than one egg a day, and many of them say, "Cholesterol is also found in the yolk, but more than 40 years of research has shown that healthy adults can eat eggs without significantly affecting their risk for heart disease."

The key words are "healthy adults" and "significantly effect".

Sure, if you are a healthy adult with a sensible life style and dieting habits, you shouldn't be concerned about eating one egg a day, otherwise don't risk your health.

I don't eat breakfast, and I seldom eat pastries. My consumption of eggs is well below average. I do like eggs; once in a while I will do an egg orgy. I will have a dozen eggs a day.

dcarch

Gahhhhh....

The correct test gives way more information about the breakdown of your cholesterol. For example, is your LDL made up of small sticky particles (BAD) or large fluffy particles (NOT BAD). There is also a very bad type of genetic cholesterol called Lp(a), which is a huge risk factor for heart disease, but can only be identified with one of the correct cholesterol tests.

This is why thin people with low cholesterol have heart attacks. Because their cholesterol is not tested as it should be. These are not expensive blood tests.

Yes - much of our cholesterol is genetic and produced via the Liver, but what we eat can and does affect it as well. I hate to say it - but wheat and sugar are big contributors to small LDL.

This is all well documented. Google it. It's unfortunate most Dr's don't address it until after someone has had a heart attack.

/Rant off. Sorry - this is a topic near and dear to my heart and I hate the fact that most Dr's are clueless or choose not to do the right thing.

Bonnie

But let's be clear here. ONLY laying hens can be free range like that. Broilers (the birds you eat) are an entirely different story. There is no such thing as a free range broiler. I've posted about this before and won't repeat the info unless someone here requests it.

However, if you want to pick on any one particular food, sugar in all of its myriad forms is a good one. At best it's a source of nutrient free calories and an appetite stimulant, neither of which most of us need. If you happen to have one of at least five genes that have been associated with diabetes, it's going to have more influence on your cholesterol than the fats in your diet, but if you won the genetic lottery, it's just bad for your teeth. Since it has been shown that risk of heart disease rises rapidly with hemoglobin A1C above 5.4% (~37 nnmol/L for Europeans), it's a good idea to have that screened periodically. Besides being more useful, it is also a cheaper and more consistent test than the VAP or NMR tests. The vast majority of people (but never "all" people) will improve their A1C (and their lipid particle size!) with weight loss. The average American of 2012 is about 25 lbs heavier than the average American of 1960 and you Europeans aren't far behind.

My own nutritional guru, Julia Childs, lived to 93.

Bonnie

When I stopped eating wheat and cut back drastically on sugar (for other health reasons), I was amazed to see that my LDL pattern move to all large (pattern A). A surprising and nice side effect.

That's just my own experience, but it leads me to believe that what you eat matters, and it's not just about losing weight.

Bonnie

Everything in moderation. You can give up anything you want but eating less meat and more vegetables/fruits/whole grains is good for everything in general.

Many people have specific health issues that require them to eat or not eat specific foods. They should do that. My brother is 58. He's thin and has cholesterol levels below 150 and no problems with blood pressure. He smokes like a chimney and eats frozen dinners (high in saturated fat and sodium). His drink of choice is instant iced tea with ten (!!) teaspoonsful of sugar. He's had two heart attacks already.

As for eggs being as bad as cigarettes, it's just another hype by the media to grab attention. They love the scare tactics, the shock value. They care little about responsible reporting. It used to be called "yellow journalism", now it's normal.

Now, for "free range". To the commercial egg industry all that means is that a chicken is allowed to go outside. There might be one small door leading to a muddy spot or even a slab of pavement. There doesn't have to be any specific amount, a barn of 10,000 chickens could have a space 6' x 6' and that's still "free range". All "cage free" means is that there are 20,000 hens shoved into a barn so crowded that there's no room to move, let alone scratch in the dirt or stretch wings. But there are no cages. Pah.

Right now Michigan is in the process of fine tuning a law that each commercial chicken raised must be given a specific amount of space. That's a good start. Oh, and they aren't antibiotic free unless they say so, in spite of the "free range" or "cage free" designations.

Look for organic eggs or buy from a local farmer where you see happy hens scratching in the yard, that's my best advice. The industry is deceptive, as most large industries are. They're in it for the money, that's what industry is. It's why I caved in and got chicks to raise into laying hens. They'll be 5 months old about Halloweed, they were hatched on my birthday, so I'll remember, LOL.

Oh, and I eat an egg nearly every day, plus what I use in cooking and baking. My doc said the effect on my cholesterol levels are "statistically insignificant" , plus my homegrown eggs are higher in Vitamin E and Omega 3 than the commercially available ones.

Annie

Maybe I'll put that salt on a hard boiled egg and call it breakfast!

Linda

Anyway, serum (LDL and HDL) cholesterol are factors in the model, so I assume they are important. The model is linked below if you want to play around with your own mortality estimates.

The reading I've done on dietary cholesterol vs serum cholesterol - and what I am reading here - suggests that the former is not as big a factor in the latter as we might have once thought, but it is still somewhere between a modest factor (for most of us) and a major factor (for a few of us). Oh, and we don't know what group we fall in, until we try changing our dietary cholesterol intake and seeing what happens.

Logically, then, our behavior via-a-vis eggs should initially be determined by our serum cholesterol level. If it is good (LDL low, HDL high), then egg away freely. If it is not so good, then we should at least try reducing our dietary cholesterol intake, and see what happens. If eschewing eggs and the like does nothing, then it is time to find some other approach. If it does something, then keep it up.

That is what I am doing. My personal experiment - with the blessing of my doctor - is to see if I can control my serum cholesterol and blood pressure without the multiple medications that I used to be on. Just through diet, exercise, and weight. The jury is still out, there are some tantalizing hints of progress but the fat lady remains mute, so we continue pressing on.

It helps that I don't like egg yolks all that much. I enjoy the occasional omelette or eggs benedict, but it is an every couple of weeks thing, and was so long before I became so interested in my lipid panel.

I do eat plenty of egg whites, though. Maybe two dozen eggs a week. Six at a time, hard boiled, discard the yolks and slice the whites, tossed in olive oil and salt. Yummy. Nowadays I try to mix in a bunch of tuna or salmon or other fish - my alternative to taking omega 3 supplements.

I would like there to be some reliable information about eggs. They're cheap, fast, taste good, and have protein, and I have no trouble going through a dozen a week.

dcarch

Annie

Annie

Being female helps greatly, says the model.

Mark's Daily Apple Is an interesting site. My hobby is reading fad diet books (if you have't guessed -- I'm an addict). Some of his advice is pretty good, but some is goofy. For instance, he decided oatmeal was not "paleo" because when he eats he feels "spacey". If you read his book, he gives samples of his daily food intake. An active guy, he eats a fairly low calorie count and maintains a low body fat as a result. If you've got diabetes genetics, it's been my observation that you have a much more, um, "assertive" appetite. Yes, you will have better satiety with some increased fat and protein in your diet and the ADA's low fat guidelines are not good, but I've seen the paleo/Atkins/Taubes diabetics gain weight with too much cheese, meat, and nuts. Additionally, he recommends "play" and condemns "chronic cardio". For those of us who are more fond of sedentary pursuits, establishing a habit of some form of physical activity, even if it's tedious and repetitive is better than never using any body part but our right foot.

That handy dandy little calculator doesn't ask about weight or exercise or whether I'm drunk in the gutter more than twice a week or whether I chew tobacco and eat butter by the stick. There are too many variables unaccounted for for me to rely on it.

Annie

Sally

I think all things in moderation. I'm not an "extreme" kind of person, so I don't jump on the bandwagon with the newest fad diet or even an old one.

I dig fence post holes (the old way, not with a machine) and chase livestock when they get out and haul bales of hay and walk fences. I run the rototiller and shovel calf pens and chicken coops.

I don't drink or smoke, and I try to eat somewhat healthy. I have my grassfed beef and homegrown chicken and fresh eggs and organic vegetables from my garden.

So, I think eggs for breakfast probably won't be the thing that kills me. I'll probably get hit by a bus, LOL. Or kicked by a horse or run over by a tractor or something else foolish.

But we all gotta die of something. And, with that cheery thought, I've got to check my refrigerator. I might be out of eggs!

Annie